25 Quick (And Funny) Tips for Muscle Growth

Handsome fit caucasian muscular man flexing his muscles in gym on diet. Brutal bodybuilder powerful training and execute exercise

iStockphoto / antondotsenko


Muscle growth doesn’t need to be complicated. These 25 quick tips are designed to boost your muscle-building efforts, and send your workout sessions into overdrive.

Add 20lbs to your bench overnight – by improving your bench press technique. Widen your grip, arch your lower back, and drive your shoulders into the bench.

Stress is the enemy of muscle. Stress releases the muscle-destroying hormone cortisol. Unless you want to lose all of your gains, it’s essential that you avoid stress at all times. This means no school, college, work, relationships or… anything really. Just gym. Gym all the time.

Go mad, brah. Or more accurately, G.O.M.A.D – Gallon of Milk a Day. Milk is packed-full of muscle-building protein, vitamins, minerals and sweet, sweet calories. If you’re serious about gaining muscle, and don’t mind gaining a little bit of body-fat, milk should be your B.F.F.

Boost bicep growth with isolation. Most dumbbell and barbell bicep exercises cause a ton of shoulder involvement. To boost your bicep growth, use preacher curls as your main mass-building exercise.

Deer Antler Velvet doesn’t work. Like most mysterious (and expensive) workout supplements, it’s total BS. Whilst you’re at it, avoid Micronized Gecko Shakes, Falcon Tendon Syrup and Gorilla Dong Powder. Hell, avoid anything that isn’t chicken.

Eat big to get big. Muscles are made in the kitchen. You are what you eat. In other words, diet is important, and your nutrition should be just as important as your workout.

Add protein powder to everything. Protein oatmeal. Protein pancakes. Protein fishcakes, protein soup, protein Big Mac, double rum-and-protein and, of course, protein protein shakes. You get the idea.

 Get stronger shoulders with seated press. Seated press prevents you from using momentum to ‘cheat’ the weight up. Perform seated barbell and dumbbell press, with a slightly lighter weight, and watch your delts grow.

Like plants, muscles require light to grow. There’s a direct correlation between exposed skin and muscle gain. 150lb gym newbies wear tees and sweatpants, 200lbs amateurs wear stringer vests and shorts, and 300lbs pro bodybuilders wear tiny little posing pouches. Dress for the body you want, and hit the gym in your girlfriend’s smallest thong.

You can’t spell Legendary without Leg Day. It’s also an anagram of Gay Lender – but that isn’t as motivational. Stick with my first quote.

Train the recently discovered calf muscles.  They’re the soft, skinny bits of your body that stick-out when you wear shorts, and according to leading broscientists, it is possible to train them. Who knew?!

Follow your squats with high-rep leg press. For a surefire way to grow your scrawny legs, try heavy squats followed by high-rep leg press. The combination will trigger both crucial types of muscle growth – sarcoplasmic and myobfibrillar hypertrophy.

If you want big forearms, you need a big grip. Grip strength training is the most direct and effective way of growing the forearms. For Popeye-style arms, you need to ditch the crappy little forearm curls, and go for heavy overhand deadlifts and dumbbell shrugs.

Find a spotter for heavy lifts. But not the squat, unless you want to look like you’re re-enacting your favorite scene from Brokeback Mountain (I swear to God I haven’t watched that film…). If you’re going heavy with the squat, find yourself a squat rack and set the safety bars to just below parallel. No squat rack free? Just plummet to the ground in a blur of barbell and broken bones – it still looks cooler than getting a spot.

Don’t be negative in the gym – unless you’re performing negative reps. This type of eccentric muscle contraction is a fantastic tool for pushing your muscle growth through plateaus and sticking points. After your working sets, perform heavy negatives with a spotter.

Boost back-development with supinated barbell rows. A palms-up, or supinated, grip will allow you to more easily recruit your back muscles. There’s an increased risk of bicep injury with this grip, so start off super-light.

Never perform cardio before working out. Cardiovascular exercise is taxing and highly catabolic. Performing cardio before weightlifting will reduce your strength and energy, so for maximum gains, save cardio for… never.

There’s no such thing as a hardgainer – only ‘little girlie men’ who aren’t man enough to pound down a dozen Big Macs and a gallon of protein shake post-workout.

Don’t be afraid of using a split-workout. Upper- and lower-body split routines are some of the most effective muscle-building programs around. Find a routine that focuses on heavy compound exercises and relatively low-training frequency – you’ll be surprised by the results.

Want big arms? Train your triceps. The triceps make up two-thirds of the total mass of your upper arm. Big arms need big triceps, so focus on heavy dips, close-grip bench and overhead dumbbell extensions.

Improve your trap development with partial deadlifts. To boost your traps, and increase your deadlift, try partial rep deadlifts. Rest a heavy barbell on squat rack supports, and using an overhand grip, practice locking-out the barbell.

Skinny guys with abs are cheaters – and fat guys with big arms are just as bad. There’s more to a ripped-physique than low-body fat, and more to a muscular frame than sheer mass. Train for a lean, strong physique, and periodically adjust your diet and routine to match.

Wear baggy shorts. Lycra shorts will crush the life out of your balls, and prevent much-needed testosterone from reaching the muscles. Yeah, that’s a total lie – but at the very least, they look super gay.

Have epic post-workout meals. Your body is most in need of protein, carbs and fats directly post-workout. Your post-workout meal should be the biggest meal of the day, fuelling your body with essential amino acids and triggering muscle growth and repair.

The most important exercises are the ones you suck at. Don’t be scared of new exercises, or exercises that you aren’t good at. If you’re bad at a particular lift, it just means that you have a ton of progress to make on it – and a ton of muscle growth will come from it. Lose the ego, and take-on your least favorite exercises.